Susan v. Vetinari
by HannahEccles
Summary: Exactly what the title says. This is my first fic. so please go easy on me.
1. Teachers and Childminders

Susan vs. Vetinari. The First Chapter:  
  
This is my very first fanfic so please, please go easy on me and please don't sue me.  
  
"G'night"  
  
"Goodnight."  
  
The Patrician of Ankh-Morpork shut the door with a barely audible sigh and stared at the woodwork for quite some time.  
  
He thought about the incredible amount of attention the six year old needed, now that she was becoming interested in the question: Exactly what did her father do as a job? Vetinari had always seemed so busy and worked- up about things to her and she just didn't understand a single word he was saying when he tried to answer her question.  
  
He sighed again. It was probably for the best that she didn't know anyway, he thought to himself.  
  
For some reason beyond his understanding, a vision of her mother came to him suddenly and he remembered....  
  
She had been a lot like him in appearance: pale skin, high cheekbones, thin bodied and dark-haired, but, as Lord Havelock Vetinari found out a year ago; she was so unlike him, deep down inside that it made him shudder to think that he had once loved her.  
  
Another vision came back to him, of how sweetly she had smiled on the night before her demise, and how she had told him that unless he really wanted to be truly recognised in the world of politics then they would have to get rid of what was holding him back....  
  
Vetinari licked his dry lips and thought about how his partner had not only been planning, but also putting into practice her own child's death.  
  
She had told him on that very night what she'd been doing to Jessica.  
  
Jessica had been ill for the few weeks running up to her mother's execution, on the night that she was at her worst, running a high fever with projectile vomiting, her mother couldn't help boasting to her partner exactly what she'd been putting into her own daughter's meals.  
  
Havelock Vetinari hadn't even hesitated to sign the death warrant for her execution the next day.  
  
Now, with her mother gone, Jessica was getting more and more demanding of her father.  
  
Her father, on the other hand, was starting to wonder what had made him want to have a child in the first place.  
  
The Patrician had been musing about all this whilst he had walked back to the Oblong Office and sat down at his desk.  
  
Ah well, he thought, back to work.  
  
He was aware that he was feeling slightly tired, a sensation that the Patrician wasn't well orientated towards. He looked at the grandfather clock that stood against the opposite wall, between the two identical doors that led to his office.  
  
It was only half nine!  
  
He stared at the clock with his head to one side and with his mouth slightly open. He blinked, turned his head straight, closed his mouth and told himself to not look so stupid in the future and to suppress the huge yawn that built up inside him, trying to escape.  
  
You'd better stop that, he told himself as his eyelids noticeably drooped, you've still got at least another two hours of this.  
  
However, body overruled mind, and, in the end, Lord Havelock Vetinari slumped forwards onto a pile of paperwork and, ten minutes later, started to snore gently.  
  
* * * * * * * * * * * *  
  
Vetinari awoke abruptly to the feel of someone shaking him awake.  
  
He sat up and peeled a piece of paper that had somehow got stuck to his face off.  
  
The Patrician clapped his hands to his sensitive ears as the usual chorus of "Daddy, wake up" being repeated over and over again bounced off the insides of he skull and threatened to give him a headache.  
  
He pushed his chair back and sat Jessica on his lap, put a finger to his lips and said "Shhhh, I'm awake now, can you please stop it?"  
  
Jessica brushed a hand up the side of her father's head.  
  
"Your hairs all funny."  
  
"Mmmm." Comes of sleeping with your head on a table. He said in the privacy of his head.  
  
"Can we play a game?"  
  
"Not now."  
  
"Please?"  
  
"No." Said Vetinari firmly.  
  
"PLEASE???"  
  
"NO." The Patrician raised his voice slightly above his daughter's.  
  
Jessica stared at him with big blue eyes filled with water and her bottom lip quivering slightly.  
  
"No." Said her father, much more gently.  
  
More puppy-dog eyes followed, but now one of the eyes were leaking tears.  
  
"But you said yesterday...."She started in a quavery voice.  
  
"I don't recall any promises." The Patrician said icily, and immediately regretted it.  
  
Jessica slipped off his lap and wandered over to one of the doors leading to and from the Oblong Office. Before she opened it, she turned back towards her father, sniffed sadly and then opened the door and meandered away sorrowfully.  
  
* * * * * * * * * * * * *  
  
"An' then he shouted at me." Jessica was recalling the events that had just happened in her own special way*  
  
*That means to say that calling it "slightly biased" was the underestimate of the century. All small children do this. One day, the scientists working on the project may find out why.  
  
She had started telling it to the first person she had met on the way to the gardens. In this case, it had been Rosemary Palm of the Seamstresses Guild.  
  
"And what did your daddy do then?" She asked kindly.  
  
"Nothin', I ran away." Which was more or less part of the true story.  
  
"Awww, you poor thing. Anyway, I'm just going to see your daddy now, so I'll talk to him about it." Mrs Palm said in her "talking to adorable children" voice.  
  
"Are you going to tell him off for being such a naughty boy?" Mrs Palm nodded.  
  
Jessica skipped of to the gardens.  
  
Mrs Palm sighed and made her way to his Lordship's office.  
  
  
  
"You have two very important jobs at the moment. One is first priority and the other...........Isn't." Mrs Palm said in her "complaining to the authorities" voice. "Can you guess which one goes where?" She snapped.  
  
"Ohhh...Um..."Vetinari pretended to think for a moment. "I suppose you're going to tell me that I should look after my daughter first and look after the city in the gaps that my daughter leaves?" Vetinari changed mid- sentence from "sarcastic son of a bitch" to "sweet as honey but deadlier than Djelibeybian asps".  
  
Mrs Palm nodded.  
  
The Patrician switched back to sarcasm. "Well, in case you haven't noticed, but it seems to me that Jessica doesn't leave any gaps for me to do anything else."  
  
"Why don't you put her in a school, or hire a childminder." The Gods know you can afford it, she added silently.  
  
Vetinari opened his mouth, closed it, put his head to one side and said, "I didn't think of that..."  
  
It was Mrs Palm's turn to let her jaw drop now. "You mean to say......" She said faintly, "that the greatest political genius of all time, who always thinks of everything, didn't think of that?" She said, disbelief ringing through her every word.  
  
The Patrician snorted.  
  
He suddenly became thoughtful. "Do you think that you could possibly find me some suitable candidates for the job?"  
  
Rosemary fell silent with misunderstanding of what the Patrician was asking her to do, "Are we still on the subject of Great Plans and Political Geniuses?" She asked politely.  
  
"No. I've gone back to childminding and schooling." He said sharply.  
  
"Well..." Mrs Palm bit her lip thoughtfully. "You do understand that this isn't exactly in my field of expertise, don't you?"  
  
"I am fully aware of that, yes." His Lordship's face was carefully immobile. "Just this one little favour..."  
  
"I suppose...I could fish around for a bit of information...you know...ask some of the gels...." She trailed off.  
  
"If you could do that for me, I would be very much pleased." The Patrician said, sincerity radiating off him.  
  
Mrs Palm stopped and hesitated at the sudden silence that bloomed upon them. "Is this meeting finished then?" She asked.  
  
Oh, yes, of course. I was forgetting myself for a minute there, sorry. Please do not let me detain you from your new-found job as a childminder and teacher searcher."  
  
Mrs Palm gratefully left the office.  
  
Ende of Parte thee firste. 


	2. Susan

Chapter two  
  
I got quite a good response for my first chapter, so here is the second.  
  
This is written approximately 2-4 weeks after the first chapter, so Mrs Palm would've had a chance to collect some info. on teachers and childminders.  
  
Terry Pratchett owns all Vetinari, Susan Sto Helit, and any other Discworld characters that jump into my story at any point anywhere.  
  
"I hear that you have had some excellent praise and recommendations from the Duke of Sto Helit upon the matter of looking after children."  
  
Susan directed an icy stare to the person sitting calmly in front of her which should have sent the man running for an emergency exit, however, he returned the stare, narrowing his eyes and tightening his lips as he did so.  
  
"Apparently the aforesaid gentleman was your father." Vetinari continued, widening his eyes slightly and raising a perfect eyebrow as he spoke.  
  
Susan nodded slightly.  
  
"And you have been both a governess and a school teacher."  
  
Susan nodded again.  
  
"Do you have any special skills?"  
  
[Do you mean apart from having some of the characteristics of Death, like being able to walk through walls?] Susan thought to herself.  
  
"No, not that I'm aware of." She lied.  
  
""No, not that I'm aware of."?" Vetinari raised his eyebrow again.  
  
"Well, no then."  
  
"Are you sure that that is your final answer, that you wouldn't want to reconsider?" Vetinari flashed a lightning smile.  
  
[He's taunting you] her conscious raged at her [do something back!]. Susan fixed her "crawl in a corner and die, you bastard" expression on her face.  
  
Vetinari raised both his eyebrows at the sudden fierce glare that she was giving him, but turned the obvious surprise on his face into an equally intimidating scowl.  
  
"Very well, seen as you were the only person to applicate for this position, then I suggest that you start wor-"  
  
"Excuse me *sir*, but what am I supposed to be doing?" Susan pronounced "sir" with the tone of voice that people usually say "cockroaches" with.  
  
"-k immediately as my daughter's private tutor.  
  
[Shit] her conscious said [I'm going to have to work with his bloody daughter day in day out.]  
  
* * * * *  
  
"My daddy said that if you betrayed me or him by trying to kill either of us, he said that he'd have you hung, drawn and quartered." Said Jessica conversationally.  
  
"Aren't you a lucky girl to have someone like that as your father." Jessica nodded. She was currently showing Susan around the Palace.  
  
"This is the toilets." Jessica tried to think of anything interesting to say about them and failed.  
  
"Very impressive."  
  
"Daddy uses a lot of sarcasm."  
  
Susan would have normally been quite surprised at this comment coming from a six year old, but she figured out that anyone who had been in Vetinari's presence for more than four minutes soon found out the meaning of sarcasm. Anyway, she was rapidly starting to hate this child with the long silky black hair done up in plaited pigtails.  
  
"I haven't heard much about your mother yet." She tried desperately to make some conversation.  
  
"Daddy had her head chopped off after he found out that she was slipping stuff into my food."  
  
"What "stuff"" Said Susan. She was just starting to get interested.  
  
Jessica shrugged. "Poison."  
  
[Ah, so obviously "happy families" was not a game well-played in the Vetinari family]  
  
"Do you have any brothers or sisters?" Susan asked.  
  
"No."  
  
Susan wasn't surprised, Vetinari didn't seem much of a fatherly person anyway, but you never knew with the aristocracy of Ankh-Morpork.  
  
"Daddy isn't allowed to have any girlfriends now." Said Jessica eyeing Susan suspiciously.  
  
"I assure you, Jessica, that is the *last* thing that-"  
  
"He can't have any girlfriends because he's not allowed any...." Jessica blushed slightly and looked down. "Any........you know........"  
  
Susan nodded slightly.  
  
"He's not allowed it because he's got AIDS. He caught it off my mum."  
  
Susan stared at her. "How exactly did you get this information?" She managed at last.  
  
Jessica shrugged. "I was listening at the door when daddy went to see the doctor."  
  
The two of them walked on in silence for a while, occasionally pausing to stop at anything that Jessica thought relevant to the tour.  
  
"This is the Art Gallery." She said, stopping at a pair of big heavy doors made of oak. She pushed hard at one of the doors and opened it up so that they were looking at a long corridor full of portraits of Patricians long gone.  
  
Susan thought it was extremely boring.  
  
* * * * *  
  
After the pair of them had finished in the Art Gallery, Susan found herself being dragged to the gardens, which was, apparently, Jessica's favourite place.  
  
"Have you ever been outside?" Susan asked her politely whilst Jessica played with a "My Little Pony" set on the lawns.  
  
"What do you mean? We're outside now aren't we?" Jessica said whilst hooking up her favourite horse to a toy carriage. "She's called Snowdrop." She said, pointing to a white pony.  
  
"I know, but.......haven't you been outside, in the city?"  
  
"Why would I want to go out there?"  
  
Susan waved a hand expansively. "I don't know. To meet people?"  
  
"But I meet people here."  
  
Susan sighed, it was going to be excruciatingly hard to teach this girl if she'd never been out into the streets. She'd have to get permission from her father to take Jessica out one day.  
  
  
  
End of part two. 


	3. Realisation

SusanvVetinariChapterThree.  
  
I think I'm going to have to start to write this in a very different style as to how I started to write the first two chapters. From now on I think that this story is going to be extremely AU and OOC. If you liked it how it was before, maybe I could post an alternative to what I've written in this chapter.  
  
I own none of the following characters. (Jessicca's already been sold to the slave markets).  
  
For reference on Lord Vetinari's Jammy Dodger addiction see "Biscuits".  
  
Chapter Three:  
  
  
  
"Daddy?"  
  
Lord Vetinari swallowed almost convulsively, choked on some crumbs and righted himself as his daughter sauntered into the Oblong Office.  
  
He realised that he still held the biscuit tin on his lap and quickly stowed it away into his bottom draw before Jessicca could reach his desk.  
  
"Daddy?"  
  
"Yes, dear?"  
  
Jessicca tried to haul herself onto Vetinari's lap, slipped halfway and flung out her hand to steady herself.  
  
The Patrician ground his teeth and tried to prise Jesicca's hand from the anatomy upon which it had landed heavily on.  
  
After he had done this, he lifted her up on to his lap, wincing slightly and shifting uncomfortably.  
  
"Daddy?"  
  
"Yes?"  
  
His daughter took hold of one of his ears and pulled his head down until his head was level with hers.  
  
She then spat in his ear.  
  
Vetinari pulled his head back sharply and frowned at Jessicca slightly.  
  
"You climbed three floors of this Palace from your playroom, stopped me in my work and bruised a painful part of my body just to expectorate in my ear?"  
  
Jessicca shook her head.  
  
"Well, what did you want?"  
  
"I was *whispering* something."  
  
"Oh."  
  
The Patrician stared down at her and wondered what could be so important.  
  
"Well, if you're unsure about anything about your body, you'd better ask the house-keeper." Vetinari hazarded.  
  
Jessicca looked at him blankly.  
  
"Oh, it's not that then." Vetinari looked somewhat relieved.  
  
"What did you mean about anything about m -"  
  
"Well, I'm glad that that's all sorted out, what did you *really* want to talk about?" Vetinari cut in rather briskly, using his "don't you dare mention that subject again" voice. Jessicca caught the rather unsubtle hint.  
  
She pulled his head down again. Vetinari obliged, feeling that if he was going to have a bad day then he may as well get it over and done with. He suffered a light overall spraying as she whispered something unintelligible in his ear.  
  
The Patrician pulled out a handkerchief from somewhere n his robe and dabbed the side of his face dry.  
  
"I'm sorry, I didn't quite hear that either."  
  
Jessicca hugged her father and rubbed her face against his chest.  
  
The Patrician sighed. This was the sort of day that where he wished he had some of those pills that the Unseen University's Bursar was so keen on.  
  
"I told the teacher that you had AIDs." She whispered into his robe.  
  
The Patrician sat absolutely still, not moving a muscle.  
  
Jessicca buried her head even further.  
  
Lord Havelock Vetinari thught some very rude words. He was thinking along the lines of :  
  
*Where the f**k did she get that from?!?* He thought frantically whilst his face was careful immobile. *Well, at least the stupid woman won't "go" for me now.* A much calmer voice cut in. *You *know* what happened when Jessicca *last* said something like that* Vetinari's calmer concious nodded metaphorically. The whole city had been avoiding im like the plague, which is roughly what Jessicca had said he'd got. Bubonically.  
  
"Even Vimes was looking at me oddly after that." He said aload.  
  
"What?"  
  
"Umm." Vetinari went on auto-pilot father. "You have been a very naughty girl, you're grounded."  
  
Jessicca nodded merrily and skipped off to go and torment some other poor being.  
  
  
  
  
  
I know. very short chapter. If you like it how I just wrote it then I'll continue in this style (please tell me in your review).  
  
If you liked it how it was before, please say this in your review and I'll go back to writing in that style.  
  
If you don't like this story at all (approx. half the Disc. Fan population) then please tell me why. (In a nice way, preferably) 


	4. In the Office

Susan Vs. Vetinari: Chapter four..  
  
Susan walked quickly through the labyrinthine corridors of the Palace, her anger radiating off her. If this had been the countryside, then small mammals and birds would have taken one look at her and slunk away silently, tails between legs.  
  
She rounded a corner and almost ran into Drumknott, the Patrician's head clerk.  
  
He glanced at her face, saw the expression upon it, and tried to scurry off quickly before she noticed him.  
  
"Drumknott?"  
  
He turned slowly, dreading the stream of insults that people often gave to him in these circumstances.  
  
"Drumknott? You know what goes on in this Palace, don't you?" Drumknott looked up at her through wide eyes.  
  
"W.w.w. well, I s.s..suppose so." He stuttered, Susan smiled sweetly and went on in a voice that was sweet as honey, yet deadly as snake's venom.  
  
"And you know where everyone is meant to be at a given time, in the Palace?"  
  
Drumknott swallowed hard and started babbling.  
  
"Wellofcourse,butsometimesapersongoesoutofthePalaceandIdon'treallyknowwheret heygo,yousee,becauseit'snotreallyanyofmybusinessreallyisit?"  
  
"I meant where anyone who works or lives in the Palace goes."  
  
".." Drumknott made a strangled noise in his throat.  
  
Susan looked at him, he was practically trembling with fear, he had gone a very horrible pasty colour and he was rolling his eyes. She decided not to breach the subject any further and strode off.  
  
Drumknott stood there for a few minutes while the pounding of his heart subsided. Eventually, he stood up properly, straightened his clothes, and wondered if he had enough time to change his underwear before he went to the City Council meeting.  
  
* * *  
  
"So you see, if only you'd sort out the business of the taxes, then-"  
  
The doors to the Rats Chamber flew open as a highly irate Susan Sto Helit strode through them.  
  
Lord Downey leaned over to his right to where Lord Vetinari was sitting.  
  
"I say, isn't that your daughter's nurse?" He whispered.  
  
"."  
  
Susan pointed a finger at the Patrician. Everyone leaned away from it.  
  
"You!"  
  
Lord Vetinari had seen many fear-enticing things in his life, but coming face-to-face with Susan on a bad day definitely reached somewhere in the top ten of "things not to do again, ever." He shuddered slightly.  
  
"Where's your daughter?!" Susan demanded, advancing on the man at the head of the table and ignoring the frightened glances at her from the room's other occupants.  
  
Lord Vetinari tried to compose himself as much as he could, and when he spoke, his voice told nothing of the primal fear that he felt coursing through his body.  
  
"She comes and goes as she pleases." He said levelly. He steepled his fingers and cocked his head to one side. "Why?"  
  
"She's not turned up for her lessons for the past three days."  
  
"Can you possibly think of any reason why she wouldn't want to come to your lessons?" Vetinari said testily.  
  
Susan scowled at him. He glared back at her.  
  
"Where have you tried looking?" He said eventually looking away after the vicious staring match.  
  
Susan's conscious cheered. *One-nil to me! * "The bedroom, study, playroom, gardens and even the privy."  
  
Vetinari frowned, tapping his pen on his lips as he did so.  
  
After a while, he held his hands up, dismissing the council, and went to find his daughter.  
  
As he passed the other lords exiting the office, they noticed that he had an extremely worried expression on his face.  
  
* * *  
  
Very short chapter I know. I got stuck on what to write and so therefore came out with this crap. Sorry.  
  
None of the characters mentioned in the above chapter are mine, they all belong to Terry Pratchett (sighs wistfully). 


	5. Hurt

Susan v. Vetinari: Chapter five.  
  
Sorry for the shortness of the last chapter; I couldn't really think of what to write.  
  
I own none of the characters that I'm using from the Discworld.  
  
Chapter five:  
  
Susan and Vetinari walked quickly through the Palace's corridors without talking. Eventually they stopped at where the main body of the building finished and the servant's quarters began.  
  
They turned to face one another, eyes narrowed to slits.  
  
Susan blinked suddenly after what seemed an age, and smiled brightly. She put a hand on Lord Vetinari's arm.  
  
"Good luck." She said shortly, and strode off in the opposite direction. She paused at the end of the corridor. "See you back in the Office." She called out.  
  
* * *  
  
The Duchhess of Sto Helit glanced up at the clock that stood opposite her in the Oblong Office. *Three hours.* She thought, *surely he couldn't have got lost in his own Palace.*  
  
Susan looked up and noted the worried face that peered through the door. It squeaked slightly and tried to go back the way that it'd come.  
  
"Drumknott?"  
  
The face appeared round the door again. "Y.y.yes? Miss Helit?" It stuttered.  
  
"Have you seen Lord Vetinari recently?"  
  
"H.how recently?"  
  
"In the past three hours, maybe?"  
  
The petrified clerk shook his head, and whilst Susan sighed and went back to glaring at the clock, ran off.  
  
* * *  
  
The door creaked open again when whilst Susan was gazing out of one of the Palace windows. Her temper snapped.  
  
"What is it *now*" She spun round.  
  
The pale equine face framed in the doorway raised a thin, almost delicate eyebrow in question.  
  
Susan turned away again furiously. *Damn the man, why does he always turn up when you least expect it?*  
  
"Jessicca has not been seen in any of the servant's rooms," he said smoothly, "in fact, none of them have seen her since yesterday."  
  
Susan felt the anger bubbling up inside her again, this time to stay.  
  
"What sort of a father are you? You don't even know where your own godsdamn daughter is when you need her, and when you don't need her, you let her wander all over the place!" She shouted, uncaring of who the person was in front of her. She strode forwards so that she was a few feet from him.  
  
"I wonder what kind of a woman would have loved you enough to have a child with you?" She said, suddenly calm, but with undertones that suggested that anything could make the storm blast through again.  
  
The Patrician's face remained impassive, but something in the eyes had changed.  
  
*I can hurt him, now.* Susan thought, *he's not so strong as he'd like me to believe.*  
  
"I bet she never loved you properly, she just wanted you for the money." Susan said quietly, she didn't care of what she said now, all the pent-up rage inside her was taking it's toll; all she wanted to do now was to try and hurt this seemingly emotionally untouchable man as much as possible.  
  
Vetinari flinched slightly, and strode off back into the corridor.  
  
Susan followed behind. "Going off to cry and sulk now, are you?" She called after him. His pace quickened.  
  
* * *  
  
Drumknott turned a corner and bumped into Lord Vetinari coming in the opposite direction, he dropped the papers that he carried and bent down, hurriedly picking them up in any order the they lay in. He muttered several apologies and didn't even notice that Vetinari had simply strode on, heedless of the surprised clerk behind him.  
  
* * * * * *  
  
And I suppose that's it for now. Another short chapter, I know, but I'm finding it a lot easier to write like this.  
  
Can you please stop sending me comments about the AIDS thing now? If you haven't worked it out yet, then I'm going to have to do something in one of the later chapters..maybe doubly underlined in capital letters and *.* either side of it. 


End file.
